When the Stars Go Blue
by TereC
Summary: Why did Jack touch Sam so much in Descent and why is it bugging her afterwards?


Title:  When the Stars Go Blue

AUTHOR: Tere C    
EMAIL: tere_c@cliffhanger.com    
CATEGORY:  Sam and Jack  
SPOILERS: Through Descent

SEASON / SEQUEL: Season 6

RATING: PG  
SUMMARY:  Just after the events of Descent    
STATUS: Complete   
DISCLAIMER: Stargate SG-1 and its characters are the property of Showtime/Viacom, MGM/UA, Double Secret Productions, and Gekko Productions.  This story for entertainment purposes only and no money whatsoever has exchanged hands.  No copyright infringement is intended. The situations and original story are the property of the author.  Not to be archived without permission of the author. 

The sound of her locker slamming shut echoed through the empty room.  Taking a deep breath, Sam picked up her black leather jacket and small purse and glanced at her reflection in the mirror.  Faint circles under her eyes from lack of sleep and a little pale, but none too worse for wear.  Her chest and throat hurt.  She guessed a near drowning does that to a body.  She hadn't reapplied any makeup.  It was late and she'd only have to wash it off when she got home.  

Slipping on her jacket, she pushed through the door and headed toward the elevator.

"Hey," a warm voice rumbled behind her causing her to stop short.  Glancing back, she watched Colonel O'Neill push away from the wall where he'd been leaning.  Waiting.

"Sir.  I would have thought you'd left hours ago."

"Yeah, well, I had some . . . thing to do.  You okay?"

"Janet cleared me.  Not bad, even with swallowing all that salt water.  "Dad's okay, too.  He and Davis should be back sometime tomorrow.  You?  Your knee?"

"Fine on both counts."

"Good.  I was just leaving, colonel," she said as she began again for the elevators and ran her keycard through the reader to call it.

He followed her, slightly favoring his knee.  "Me, too.  I'll ride up with you."  He smiled a little, which seemed odd.  Actually, he seemed more than a little nervous.  

The doors slid open and as Sam stepped in she noticed his hand at the small of her back.  He was doing it again.  Touching her.

"Okay.  Stop it.  What's going on?" she asked, spinning to face him, his hand still at her waist.  The doors closed giving them a moment of privacy.

"What?"

She backed away from him, from his touch, to push a button on the control panel and stared at the blinking numbers as the car began its assent.  "This . . . hovering over me.  Touching me.  You did it on the mothership—a lot—and I want to know why."  

"I don't know wh—"

"For example, sir, outside of the glider bay during the self-destruct countdown, you patted me on the back."

"Yeah, so?"

"So?  So, why?"

"I was trying to take the pressure off of you."

"It wasn't working."

"I know—you seemed frustrated that you couldn't reprog—"

"I was frustrated because you were distracting me."

"Okay.  I'm sorry.  I won't do it again."

They were quiet for a long moment before Jack spoke again.  "I'm worried about you, Carter."

She closed her eyes before speaking.  "I knew I shouldn't have said anything," she whispered.  "You know that fear thing I brought up back during Anubis' attack—it's over and done with.  You can forget about it."

"Yeah, right." 

The doors opened and Jack paused to allow her to exit first.  They went to the security desk and signed out before heading for their vehicles.  He walked with her to her car and waited for her to get out her keys.  

"Carter, I won't begin to say I understand anything that you're going through, but if you need to talk.  Well."

_Talk, she thought.  "Okay, who are you and what have you done with Colonel O'Neill?"_

Jack's mouth turned up in a little smile, almost apologetic, but his eyes were somber, gentle.  He was sincere with his offer. 

"Sir, I'm serious.  You don't . . . talk—this isn't your style.  You're more the 'suck it up and get over it' sort of guy.  What gives?"

"You tell me, Major," Jack said.  He leaned against the SUV behind him, crossing his arms in front of him before he continued.  "You've never admitted to being afraid before, and we've been in tight spots lesser men wouldn't be able to handle.  You've always stuck it out.  This isn't like you to doubt your abilities."

"It's not like I've been a heck of a lot of help lately, sir."

"That's not true.  It was your plan that sent me up in the X-302."

"Only after Jonas gave me the idea.  I would have never thought of it without him.  And that idea nearly crashed and burned."

"But we're here now talking about it.  I wouldn't call that a crash and burn."

"Because of _your idea to use the hyperdrive and Jonas coming up with the way to do it."_

"Gaaaa! What are you getting at, Carter?"

"We got lucky, Colonel.  How many times have I screwed up lately and the only thing that got us out of it is luck?"

"I don't think you screwed up."

"Well, maybe that's because you've lost your objectivity."  Sam turned away and punched the alarm button on her key chain to unlock her car door.  Nothing.  "Crap," she said as she inserted the key into the lock to open the door.

"What?"

Sam stuck the key in the ignition and turned.  Nothing, not even the click of the starter.  She flipped the switch for her headlights and only got a dim brown flickering light that faded to black.

"Looks like you need a lift."

"I can't believe I . . . "

"Come on, Carter.  Let me take you home."

She looked up at him in defeat.  "Fine."  She slammed the door, locked it, and then followed him to his truck where he opened the door for her.  His hand lingered at her elbow as he helped her step up into the cab and she glared at him.

"Sorry," he said letting her go and shutting the door.  He got in, started his truck, and put it in gear.

Classical music filled the cab, a hauntingly sweet arrangement by Chopin.  Sam clicked her seatbelt around her and leaned back into the oversized leather seat.  That was one thing about a big truck, big comfy seats.  Didn't find seats like this in sports cars like hers.  Exhaling, she closed her eyes, tired of talking, tired of feeling . . . everything, and she let the sound of violins and a soft piano relax her mind.

The piece was ending when she heard the tires crunch across gravel as the colonel made a turn.  He drove down a secluded road, the nighttime sky blocked by tall pines.  

"I thought you were taking me home?"

"I am . . . eventually."

The road led to a clearing with an incredibly tall tower.  Metal framework that glowed silver in the moonlight went up into the sky at least a hundred, hundred and fifty feet even, and was topped by a large, dark box.  

"Come on," he ordered exiting the cab.  He reached into the backseat to grab a blanket to ward off the chilly Colorado night.

"Where are we?"

"An old fire tower.  The forestry service abandoned it when they built new facilities, but it's in fairly decent shape.  I've replaced a few of the floorboards for safety's sake."

"You want to go up there?"

"Yeah.  Come on, Major."

"What about your knee?"

"It's a little sore, but I've got a brace on it.  Shouldn't be a problem.  Ladies first, Major."

"So you can stare at my ass, sir?"

"That's just a perk," he said, grinning.  "No, so I'll be behind you if you slip.  I know the ladder, you don't."

"Oh."

Jack tossed the blanket over his shoulder and went to the ladder, waiting for her.  "Trust me, Carter."

She stared at him long and hard before deciding to climb the damn ladder, hooking one arm around each rung as she ascended slowly.  She glanced down once to see him just a few rungs beneath her, watching where he placed his hands more than watching her rear.  It took a few minutes to reach the top of the ladder, which came up through the floor of the watchtower.   

Well above the treetops, the room was windowed on all sides to allow scanning of the surrounding forest, actually miles and miles of territory, for evidence of a potential fire threat to the trees and the community.  At night, it was breathtaking.  The dark velvet sky stretched forever and the stars seemed brighter, only fading a bit over the city due to ambient light.  One window had been broken out allowing a chilly breeze to circulate through the square room.  

"Here, Carter, take this." Jack held the blanket out to her before hoisting his weight through the opening to the room.  "Whatcha think?"

"It's beautiful." 

"That's what I'd hoped you'd say."  He took the blanket back and wrapped around her shoulders.  "Your jacket isn't heavy enough for up here."

Sam smiled at his concern.  The water that had nearly drowned them had been much, much chillier than the night air.  "I've been colder recently.  We both have."

Returning her smile, Jack faced the open window and propped on his arms to stare into the darkness, and she followed suit to stand next to him.  "I come up here sometimes with my telescope—a smaller one than that one at my house.  Light pollution from the city makes it more difficult to watch the stars at home.  I come here sometimes after we get back from a mission, and they're still there.  They're still the same.  Still doing what they do.  

There's something about getting away from everything out there and coming up here that puts things into focus, you know?" he asked.

She nodded, but she really didn't know.  Escape for her was her lab, burying herself so deeply within her work she didn't have time to worry about focus.

"Carter, I meant it when I said I'm worried about you."

"There's nothing to worry about, Colonel.  I'm sorry about what I said earlier.  I'm just tired."

"You sure there's not more to it than that?"

"Everything's just been moving way too fast for me and I keep screwing up."

"How?  How do you think you've screwed up?"

"I nearly got us drowned when I couldn't open the damn door!"

"Neither could your dad and there was two of him working on it.  Try again."

"That's just part of it, Colonel.  This has been going on for a while.  My miscalculations with the asteroid a few months ago.  Had I not caught it—"

"But you did."

"But what if I hadn't.  And, then there's the K'Tau sun, and nearly losing Teal'c in the buffer, not to mention—"

Jack took her by the shoulders, gripping tightly, and turned her to face him.  He could see tears glistening on her cheeks.  "Stop it, Carter.  Just stop it.  We can go through all the what ifs and the near misses we've had and it won't change a thing."

"I don't know that I should be trusted to do this anymore.  I think you should find someone else to fill my space on SG-1."

"I trust you, Carter.  I trusted you enough to do that insane hyperdrive maneuver with the gate."

"That was different."

"How?  How was that different than any of the other times I've trusted you to come up with the solution?"

"You came up with that solution, Colonel."

"And I couldn't have done it without you."

"And I could have got you killed."

"And the alternative to that was all of us getting killed.  Where are we going with this conversation, Sam?"

She laughed in spite of herself.  "God, I don't know.  What started all of this?"

"You were pissed because I patted you on the back.  I still don't get that."

"We've changed, Colonel."

"Okay.  And that's a bad thing?"

"It's just . . . you haven't, we haven't even really touched in such a long time.  Not since . . . "

"Not since we were Thera and Jonah."

"Yeah.  And it wasn't just that, but we had an audience."

"It was Teal'c.  He's safe, and if memory serves, he knows—he was there when we had to . . ."

"And we decided to leave forget about it."

"And we have, haven't we?  Well, except when we were Thera and Jonah and made to forget about everything and, even then, we really didn't."

She smiled again as he blustered his way through the sentence.  If anything, the memory wipe had given them the freedom to feel.

"No, we didn't, did we?"

"Carter.  I shouldn't say this, but I was glad for the whole five minutes we were shut down after the Anubis thing.  Hammond offered me any command I wanted and all I wanted to do was walk away. . . to you  He was talking about retiring and asking what I wanted and I was so close to telling him."

"Telling him?"

Jack dropped his hands from her shoulders and crammed them into the pockets of his jacket.  "Telling him what he could do with another command.  Listen, I'm sorry if I made you uncomfortable."

She nodded again.  

"I just wish we could go back sometimes, Carter."

"Back?"

"Back to when we weren't afraid to touch each other.  Hell, I remember a couple of really nice hugs . . . "

"I do, too, sir."

"What?  Wish we could go back or remember those hugs?"

"Both."

"Yeah, but things change."

"Yes."

Jack walked over to the other side of the tower to where the sky was beginning to lighten.  "Here, this is what I wanted you to see."  

Sam obediently followed him to the opposite window, standing close to him.  Unable to resist, she rested her head against his shoulder as they watched the sun begin its rise over the treetops.  Yellows, pinks, and oranges spread into the deep blue of the night and the stars slowly faded into the pale blue of the morning sky. 

"You're kinda like those stars, Sam.  Even though you can't see them, you know they're there.  They're constant, just like you."

"Jack O'Neill, poet," she said, a little laugh behind the words.

"Yeah, just keep that to yourself, huh?"  

Sam swiped at her eyes and didn't resist when he finally broke down and pulled her into a hug.  She snuggled deep into his embrace, tucking her face into the crook his neck, and slipping her cold hands around his waist and under his jacket.  

When he spoke again, his words ruffled her hair.  "Sam, don't think I ever doubt you.  You're the only one doing that."  

He held her for a long time, and she let herself enjoy the feeling of being in his arms.  Maybe someday they would be allowed more than this.  Until then, she'd just have to try to keep them both alive.  

The End


End file.
